Transcript:

Male Voice: Earth and sky.

Dr. Francis Collins: The health of our nation
is good, better than it has been for decades, but it could be better.
And the scientific approach to understanding the causes of disease
offers us the hope of real revolutions.

Deborah Byrd: You’re listening to Francis
Collins, director of the National Institutes of Health. He said
the NIH is the largest supporter of biomedical research in the
world, with an annual budget of $31 billion. Dr. Collins spoke
of NIH priorities for the next five years.

Dr. Francis Collins: The first of those is to
apply some of the very new and very exciting high-throughput technologies.

Deborah Byrd: In other words, cutting-edge robotics
to conduct millions of lab tests at once, and to get a comprehensive
understanding of how disease occurs.

Dr. Francis Collins: We can go from having snapshots
about biology and medicine to having really comprehensive views
that are going to change the landscape in dramatic ways for cancer,
for autism, for diabetes, on down that list.

Deborah Byrd: He also spoke of health care reform
in the U.S.

Dr. Francis Collins: We are clearly attempting
to re-engineer our health care system to result in better outcomes
and lower costs, but we need data, and NIH, by running clinical
studies to look at what works and what doesn’t work, can
inform that in really important ways.

Deborah Byrd: He said NIH priorities also include
the next generation of medical researchers and global health. EarthSky
is a clear voice for science.